quarta-feira, 9 de março de 2016

Opinion: America's Trumper-Tantrum / DER SPIEGEL

Opinion:
America's Trumper-Tantrum

By Holger Stark

Donald
Trump's campaign seem unstoppable. His populist message is seductive
in a country with deeply concentrated wealth and an apparent
unwillingness to change the status quo. It may land him in the White
House.

Donald Trump is
currently leading the race for the Republican nomination with 446
delegates, and his presidential campaign seems unstoppable. How could
this have happened, and what lessons should we take away from it?
It's the economy, stupid! Trump's ascent has a lot to do with the
developments in America's economy over the past two decades. In
today's United States, parallel worlds have emerged -- the fortunes
of the super-rich are growing exponentially and the 400 richest
Americans have command over as much wealth as the bottom 61%. The
annual income of an average family has, by contrast, sunk by almost
$5,000 over the past 20 years. One of the United States' greatest
myths is at risk: that of the American Dream.

The American Dream
promises that anybody can be successful, regardless of background or
skin color. It is a promise of advancement and an incentive to
realize one's fullest potential. The American Dream is the cement
that has until now held together a diverse and fragmented nation. Yet
when two jobs are not enough to feed a family, this promise is
broken. Indeed, access to this success has slipped out of reach for
many Americans. Bernie Sanders' unexpected rise among Democrats shows
just how widespread this sentiment has become.

The reason Trump's
promise to "make America great again" has been so effective
is that it revives this dream and reaches voters who long ago turned
their backs on the political system. A considerable share of his
voters are based in rural regions and suburbs. They are likely to be
poor, working class and lacking a college education. Trump appeals to
the kind of voters who have been left behind by the forces of
modernization -- people disconnected from societal progress who have
neither profited from wealth nor the digital revolution.

Sweet Seduction

There is no lack of
proposals for combatting social inequality. What is missing is the
will of the elite. But for as long as those who profit from the
division of society are not prepared to relinquish at least a modicum
of their power, privilege and affluence, Trump's sweet seduction will
not diminish.

The very Republicans
who complain that Trump is destroying their party also share
responsibility for his success. This is the product of a movement
that has taken shape in recent years at the conservative periphery of
society -- one that originally called itself the Tea Party and
mobilized against Barack Obama and his healthcare reforms. But now
this hatred-fueled movement against Obama's new, ethnically diverse
and politically correct America is melding itself with a deep
animosity toward the state in a veritable clash of cultures.

The Republican Party
leadership not only permitted this movement, it also embraced it --
at times partly even enthusiastically supporting it, with disastrous
consequences. Today, railing against Washington has become de rigueur
-- the cruder, the better. When the elite, the government and its
institutions have nothing but contempt for each other, it is only a
matter of time before the people follow. This provided ideologically
fertile soil for Trump's success to grow. Instead of competing over
who can most effectively dismantle the state, Republicans should be
promoting it -- acting as a true pillar of order in the body politic
rather than a minimal, "night-watchman" state that does
little more than provide for the security of its people.

The Perfect Storm

Trump's triumphs are
also the result of successful publicity efforts. He uses social media
to reach voters directly, thereby bypassing the media's societal
filter and an audience of critics. With 6.6 million Twitter and over
a million Instagram followers, Trump has created his own public. The
result is a brutalized discourse. The raw, unfiltered tenor of the
Internet and Trump's outbursts have an amplifying effect on each
other. Trump also profits because he is allowed to be the loudest and
most brutal and unscrupulous politician, without anyone holding him
accountable. This, fortunately, is at least beginning to change as
the media and politicians are starting to understand the gravity of
the situation.

These factors have
all combined to create the perfect storm -- one that needed the
perfect candidate to harness its strength. Trump is this perfect
candidate, and it is very possible that he will be sworn in as the
45th President of the United States in January 2017.

From a European
perspective, it may be compelling to behold Trump's meteoric rise
with horror and to delight in the spectacle with a pinch of
anti-American zeal. Yet the aforementioned factors exist, even if in
a milder form, in Europe as well. In Germany, the perfect candidate
has been lacking thus far, but figures such as Geert Wilders or
Marine Le Pen underscore the fact that this may not remain true for
long. We Europeans would be well advised to study Trump's rise as a
cautionary tale and to learn from it.